


The Gift of Tides

by walkerminion



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: F/F, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-05
Updated: 2010-06-05
Packaged: 2017-10-09 22:32:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/92306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/walkerminion/pseuds/walkerminion
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At Leia's wedding, the turning tide reveals a buried truth between Luke and Han.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Gift of Tides

**Author's Note:**

> This story was originally published in the Star Wars 'zine "The Rest of the Garbage," and archived at Elusive Lover under the pseudonym AlexJ.

_Explode, secrete your tender; Let's scream out like the sea_ \--Peter Murphy, _The Sweetest Drop_

Wakefulness crept over Luke with an improbable sense of familiarity. He shifted carefully, becoming aware of hot skin against his cheek, of a sheet, damp with combined sweat, tangled around their legs. A strong arm flung loosely across his back. Deep, even breaths, the coarseness of hair against his palm where it rested on a broad chest.

_*Home,* _was his first thought. And his second was that he didn't need to open his eyes just yet. He lay where he was, listening to the faint murmur of surf drifting in from outside, the keening of gulls. He already knew the Force and texture of Corellia's atmosphere well enough to guess that the sun wasn't up yet, and when it rose, it would bring a flawless blue summer day. The kind of day Leia deserved.

He smiled against Han's chest and felt the sinewy arm tighten around him, a gentle hand stealing into his hair. "Hey, kid." Han's breath against his temple, warm and scented with wine from the night before, sour but reassuringly real. *_Not a dream.*_ "You okay?"

There was a note of anxiety in the deep voice, and Luke levered up a little on his elbows, opening his eyes at last to capture a questioning gaze. He bent his head and brushed their mouths together by way of an answer. Han opened for him with a soft groan, long fingers knotting in his hair. Their tongues met, caressing, exploring, and Luke shifted on the narrow bunk, pushing Han on to his back in search of a deeper angle. Velvet hardness nudged his belly. He chuckled into their kiss, pulling up for a breath. "You don't waste much time."

Han tried a rakish grin that softened instantly, uncharacteristic vulnerability in his smile. "We've wasted enough, don't you think." It wasn't exactly a question. Large hands molded his face, tracing his cheek and jawline as if trying to be sure he was real. "You don't know how many times I've woken up like this--" Han nodded in the general direction of his cock, "thinking of you."

"Oh." Luke felt a prickle of heat creeping up his throat, and knew he must be turning the same color as the scarlet y'kan bark they'd eaten in the galley the night before. Sometimes he still felt like an ignorant farmboy, even now. Even with half the galaxy watching, waiting for him to become their savior.

Han just smiled, leaning up to trail a kiss down the length of his nose. "Nothing to be embarrassed about. And don't tell me it never happens for you."

Luke swallowed hard. "Sometimes," he admitted. "I get these dreams..." This was so strange, suddenly being able to talk about things that had been among his deepest secrets just the day before. "I'd dream you're wrapped around me, like that night on Hoth. Touching me."

"Touching how?" A hand traveled down his spine, making lazy circles against the small of his back.

"I..."

The hand drifted lower, cupping his bottom, fingers tightening.

"Yeah. Like that, and like last night..."

"Like this?" Han's palm curved around Luke's hip and slipped between their bodies, fingers splaying over his groin to cradle the swelling heat there. Luke shivered, sighed, pressed into the hand, and felt Han's grip tighten. He gasped, startled by his body's lightning response to that gentle, searching touch, to hands that seemed to know him in every detail. As if they'd been lovers for at least a lifetime.

"And this," he managed finally, leaning down to kiss Han again softly, slowly, taking the time to tease his lips apart and search out every nuance of texture and taste. The warm mouth explored his in turn, and Han pushed up against him, powerful legs twining through his own to lock their bodies together.

When he drew back from the kiss he saw what he'd seen the night before, that curious misting of the dark eyes, a matching tremor in the hand that had cupped his erection through the material of his pants. This, above all, had astounded him. Made it both real and unreal, a wondrous thing that simply could not be happening. And not like this.

"You'd really thought about this before?"

"Oh yeah," Han whispered. The answer that had been there yesterday at Leia's wedding, when he'd turned and found that Han was watching him.

 

* * *

 

Rites of passage, according to Corellian tradition, were to be held at either sunrise or sunset, symbolizing the transition from one stage of life to the next. The clan Leia was marrying into favored sunset for weddings, so it was just before dusk that Luke and Leia began their trek across the moor to the cliff-top spring where the Cabans had worshipped for generations.

He'd accepted his role as her Guide with mixed feelings. He'd grown to like Ryiisa Caban, Leia's chosen bondmate, and her effect on Leia was unmistakable. It was becoming easy to imagine her as his sister-in-law, though at the same time, the thought of Leia being with anyone but Han struck him as... odd. Out of balance, as though she were violating an unspoken agreement they'd had between the three of them.

If Leia noticed his discomfort, she gave no sign. Padding barefoot in the grass beside him, she looked like she could have been born to this place, her hair fluttering loose on the breeze, eyes shaded against the brilliance of the sunset. She wore a forest green cloak over her knee-length wedding tunic, the color bearing a silent memorial to the Royal House of Alderaan and the family she'd lost. Significantly, she'd given no similar tribute for Anakin Skywalker, their biological father. Luke guessed that this would have been the case even if her parentage had been known outside a select circle of trusted friends. He couldn't blame her for not wanting to acknowledge the man who'd become Darth Vader, especially not on her wedding day. Even so, it deepened his sense of dislocation, for it meant that he couldn't attend as her brother, but only as a friend.

The moor stretched behind them in swells of rolling grassland, rhythmic like the ocean. Like the dune sea. Ahead, a circle of standing stones loomed dark against the day's final brilliance, poised at the very edge of the seaside cliff. Luke caught the murmur of voices and quiet music, the sweet clarity of pine incense mingling with briny ocean scents from the beach below.

Everything visible from here was part of the Caban family's private domain. The beach, the bordering cliffs with their terraced landing platforms, the moors, and even the fishing hamlets scattered along the northern coastline. He supposed that all of this would belong to Leia as well, once the water ritual made her a member of the clan. It was strange that she was able to belong here so easily when this was Han's world, the place where he'd been born. And yet she was at home here, while Han was... wherever he'd been for the last year.

"Ready?" Leia flashed a quick smile at him, not waiting for his answer as she stepped through the stone archway. Luke followed, abruptly self-conscious when a hundred or more richly dressed people turned to watch them enter the circle. He'd been told it was a small wedding by Corellian standards, but it still came as a shock to find himself in the presence of so many after months of relative solitude. For a moment, all he saw was a blur of faces against an opulent canvas of silks and velvets. Then familiar faces began to emerge, one by one.

Mon Mothma, Rieekan, Ackbar and Madine were positioned near the back, observing the proceedings in the company of the Corellian ambassador and his family. He noticed that Artoo and Threepio were on the far side of the circle, positioned close to the western exit in an apparent nod to the typically Corellian mistrust of droids. Threepio's hand was resting lightly on his companion's domed top. Luke smiled, thinking they looked for all the world like an old pair of bondmates themselves.

Then he spotted Lando, resplendent in a midnight blue cape that cunningly harmonized with both his own skin tones and those of the astonishingly beautiful Twi'lek male draped against his arm. Toben Caban, Ryiisa's mother, was standing at the very front, flanked by her two husbands, Pyr and Galt. Ryiisa's brothers and sisters were ranged behind them, along with their various spouses and children. Luke had met each member of the family at least once, but the names had become a blur in the frenzy of activity leading up to the wedding.

He knew better than to look for Chewbacca. The Wookiee was with his mate on Kashyyyk, attending the birth of their second cub. Chewie'd transmitted his regrets several days earlier, sounding apologetic that he couldn't say where Han was, or guess whether he'd be attending.

...Han. Luke knew he'd been scanning the crowd for just one reason, one face. Han had been invited, of course, though Luke supposed he was the only one naive enough to hope that he'd actually come. The messy and widely publicized nature of his split with Leia would certainly be good enough reason to steer clear, if only to avoid setting off another round of lurid speculation on the holonet services.

_*What would you think, if you were here now?*_ Irrational though it was, he couldn't shake the feeling that this was a kind of betrayal, a gesture that sealed off any possibility of returning things to the way they'd been. But just behind that lay the truth, the thing he'd managed to avoid knowing for such a long time. The thing that kept him awake nights, missing Han in ways he couldn't have imagined missing anyone. A visceral longing, a hunger that ran deeper than physical want. *_What would you think if I told you?*_

A murmur rippled through the crowd, disrupting his train of thought. He followed their gaze to the far entrance where Ryiisa had appeared, a slim silhouette against the dying sun. She wore her ceremonial clan dagger slung low above her left thigh, the silver handle bright against the deep blue of her wedding tunic. She grinned broadly at them, teeth flashing white against her tanned features. A glance sideways at Leia told him everything he needed to know. She was... glowing, and that was the only word that really described it. As if the sun's last rays were soaking out through her skin. She turned to meet his gaze, smiling at him through a faint luster of tears.

"Yes," she whispered, as if she'd read the question off his face.

He nodded without words, astonished by what he was about to do; what they were both about to do. And by the realization that he'd never seen her like this, not even during those first weeks after Endor when she and Han could still be called lovers by some reasonable understanding of the word. This was real -- and that hurt, though in a way that now felt completely right.

Leia squeezed his hand. "You're more nervous than I am," she observed with a small, bright grin, her voice too low for anyone else to hear. She dipped her chin, indicating her lack of shoes. "Don't you dare say you're getting cold feet, because you'll get no sympathy from me. Shall we?"

He started down the steps mechanically. The stone circle had been built around an artesian well, a gesture that spoke of reverence and of the clan's power, that they could afford to dedicate a source of freshwater solely to the worship of the gods. A round dais had been built at the heart of the circle, and the springwater was channeled to the top of a worn granite plinth through a series of stone ducts. From there it sheeted down to form a shifting, torchlit mirror.

Ryiisa materialized on the far side of the plinth as they approached it, her figure an indistinct wraith of water-shadows. The red-bearded blur beside her was her own Guide, Bran Feira. Ryiisa's selection of Guide had been as much a surprise to many people as Leia's own choice had been. Bran and Ryiisa had been bonded for a short while after they'd both come of age, and while the marriage hadn't lasted, the underlying friendship obviously had. *_We were too young and dumb to work out all the implications,*_ Ryiisa had joked a few sunsets earlier, as she, Luke and Leia sampled local bitter in one of the seaside taverns. *_I mean, what kind of a name is Bran Caban?_* But there'd been an enormous tenderness in her eyes when she'd added, *_Nothing's ever really lost, you know.*_

Luke watched as Bran and Ryiisa exchanged brief smiles behind the curtain of water. Then Toben Caban stepped to the base of the dais and raised her arms, bringing her palms together to signal the commencement of the rite. He stepped forward with Leia, bringing her to the edge of the pool that surrounded the base of the plinth. Taking her arm, he guided her hand to meet Ryiisa's. The women's fingers met through the intervening wall of spray, and Luke felt a tiny shock of recognition travel up his sister's arm. Then her eyes slipped shut, fingers lacing through Ryiisa's and gripping tight. With that, it was out of his hands. He released Leia's arm and stepped away, catching a brief glimpse of Bran doing the same thing on the other side.

A murmur of anticipation swept over the crowd as the women stepped into the calf-deep pool dividing them. Toben nodded in silent benediction and the water barrier was lifted, completing the rite. Bran strode down from the dais to take his place at Toben's side, formally relinquishing his role as Guide. Luke moved to do the same thing, but got no further than the first step -- because there, standing just inside the circle's eastern entrance, was Han.

His mouth went dry, and he stood frozen for a moment, his foot poised on the first step of the dais. Han was standing with his hands thrust deep in the pockets of his bloodstriped pants. He seemed slightly out of breath, as if he'd just run up the hill, wind-ruffled hair sticking to the faint sheen of sweat on his brow. His shirt was buttoned all the way up in a rare nod to propriety, though he still looked completely out of place amid the wedding party's relentless elegance.

And Han was watching him. *_Him,* _not Leia, the kind of look he'd given him once before, when they'd said goodbye in the hangar on Hoth. Intense and thoughtful, dark brows knit together. Enough to catch his breath, to send his heart speeding. "Han...!" The name tore itself out of him and he launched himself without thinking, wanting nothing but to grab Han by his shoulders and-- A cheer went up. The crowd surged forward, surrounding him with a circle of delighted faces, a dozen hands trying to shake his at once. Han was swallowed in the press of bodies, and Luke didn't see him again until much later.

 

* * *

 

Leia and Ryiisa left the reception just after midnight. Luke walked with them along the wide swath of starlit beach to the dock where their sea-glider bobbed on the waves, a uniformed pilot waiting to take the couple to the nearby Crescent Islands for what Leia termed a "post-wedding escape." He said his goodbyes, then watched until the small craft was nothing more than a speck on the horizon.

At last he turned away, heading back along the waterline. A shoal of surf-riders were cutting the waves on his right, their dark, finned backs glistening in the starlight. A salt breeze lifted their cries in a long ascending chorus, wild and triumphant. He saw gulls wheeling white like ghosts against the sky and ran after them, stretching his hands out to test the wind as they did. *_It's okay.*_ The words flitted through his mind, bright like shards of starlight on moving water. *_Everything...* _He threw his head back, his shout carried high against the stars.

Everything.

He stopped in his tracks, arms wide, the wind buffeting his face. To see Leia smile like that, as he'd never seen her smile. To know, without question, that it was only the beginning, that she'd wake up and smile the same tomorrow. Eyes closed now, he could reach below the patterns of wind and waves, touching the heart of a breathless silence. Far out at sea, a stillness waited on the border of some great, unfathomed change.

Ryiisa had told him this was the Big Tide, the tide of midsummer, which always fell within a few days of the solstice. Corellians regarded tides with particular reverence, which was the reason why beaches were a traditional site for wedding feasts. The returning tide was thought to strengthen the newly-established bond by linking it to the cycles of eternity, and the solstice tide was considered the most auspicious time of all.

_*They say it brings more of everything,* _Ryiisa had told him. *_Better luck, healthier babies, bigger harvests, faster ships... whatever. Besides,*_ she'd added with a smirk, *_my mother'll go into synaptic shock if we don't do everything just like we're supposed to.* _ Leia had seemed more than happy to go along with the traditional wedding Ryiisa's family obviously expected. *_If there's one thing I've learned,*_ she'd said wryly, *_it's not to argue with Corellians.*_ Ryiisa just grinned at that, rolling her eyes.

Overall, Leia's courtship of Ryiisa, a clan chieftess and ruler of the Corellian Shipbuilder's Guild, had received far more respectful attention from the press than her relationship with Han. *_It's boring,* _both women had theorized in unison, and then laughed when Luke gave them a puzzled look. *_It's what everyone expects,* _Leia explained. *_For me to choose someone with a pedigree.* _Then her gaze had softened, and Luke wondered what she'd seen in his expression.

He started walking again, the surf a constant, rhythmic pull on his right. The party was still in full swing when he came in sight of it, music drifting sweetly on the night breezes. Glowspheres had been strung on ropes between the shoreline tents like tiny suns, and firelight from the cooking pit sent the shadows of dancers leaping long across the sand. A flock of white-clad servers burst from one of the catering tents, spicy food-aromas whiffing appetizingly on the breeze. It occurred to Luke that he hadn't eaten since that morning, and he followed in the servers' wake as they made for one of the banquet tables. And that was where he saw Han again.

Han had his hip perched on the edge of the table, one hand wrapped around a steaming mug of spiced wine, talking with Toben and Pyr Caban as if they'd been friends for years. Luke smiled at the sight. He couldn't hear what Han was saying from this distance, but the animated gestures suggested he was in the middle of a story. Luke watched him for a moment, his appetite forgotten, mesmerized by the fluid economy of Han's body language.

He didn't seem out of place here. Standing in the firelight Han seemed like a mariner from the pages of Corellian legend, back from the sea with tales of strange, faraway places. This was Han as Luke remembered him from the smoky cantina in Mos Eisley, bristling with dangerous sensuality and the promise of adventure. His throat tightened at the thought, the reality, of the intervening years. He wondered if he'd ever shake the memory of waking up to find Ben's house a tomb of molten shadows around him, the stench of carbonite crushing a scream deep inside his body. *_What I'd have given to breathe for you.*_

He stood rooted where he was, his impulse to rush forward now stalled against a deeper, warning instinct. Seeing Han at the wedding hadn't exactly come as a surprise. It was closer to the feeling he'd had on Hoth, and then again on Endor: the sense of a cycle quietly completing itself and unfolding into something new. Now it hovered between them, vibrant with the potential to become anything. He turned away from the conversation, fearful that joining it now would break some half-perceived rhythm.

He crossed the stretch of beach to where the waves had marked intricate patterns of foam on the dark sand. The surf-riders were gone by now, and the ocean was a vast, textured emptiness before him. He walked slowly beside the water, hands deep in his jacket pockets. Far in the depths of the Corellian night, he felt the tide shift, water turning to follow the moons back to shore.

He didn't wait long. He stopped at the sound of footsteps approaching from behind, the strides long and unmistakable. Han's hand settled on his shoulder. "So," came the deep voice. "What d'you think?"

"About what?" Luke responded with delay, trying to decide if Han were referring to Leia, Ryiisa, or some aspect of the wedding itself.

Han gestured to the ocean instead. "I figure they don't make 'em like this on Tatooine."

"No," Luke managed. "It's... amazing." A laughably inadequate word for what he felt. The slow drag of Han's fingers against the shoulder of his jacket diverted him from coming up with anything more descriptive.

"Yeah." Han fell silent, staring past him to where the water met the sky.

"I wasn't sure you'd come," Luke said after a pause.

Han chuckled amiably. "I was pretty sure I wouldn't. Then I got thinking it might be a nice gesture to show 'em all there's no hard feelings... nah." He dismissed the rest of the sentence with a wave of his hand. "That's not really it. Guess I just missed you."

"*_Missed* _me?" He turned to search Han's gaze in the starlight, suspended between a delicious unraveling and the sturdy constraints of realism. Han could hardly have missed him in *_quite*_ the way he'd missed Han. He couldn't have woken up feverish and trembling in the core of the night, hard and aching and ready to shatter at the merest brush of sheets against his skin. Burning up for a taste he could guess at but never know, half ashamed when he sucked the wet saltiness from his fingers and imagined it anyway.

"Where were you, all this time?" The question came out unconsidered, startling him with the pang of bitterness behind it. *_How did you miss me, Han?*_

"Couldn't hack it. You know me n' these diplomatic functions--"

"Not tonight," Luke cut in impatiently. "Where were you this whole last year?"

"Around," Han evaded, then stopped, visibly checking an impulse before he tried again. "Leia n' me -- well, you know she saw the reefs up ahead long before I did. I was so bound and determined to make it work, I guess I needed time to sort things out after she finally cut me loose." He reached behind his neck, massaging a sore spot. "That's the short version of the story. The long one's uglier."

Luke glanced to the side. "I didn't mean to..." He looked up at Han again, and found something in the dark gaze that he couldn't interpret. A bordering smile, and something else. His mind swung in lazy, addled loops around the time their eyes had met in the Hoth hangar, as if they'd stepped directly from that moment into this one. As if the time between was nothing more than a dream. The moment spun out to become its own, quiet eternity, until he couldn't imagine anything different. In the end they both looked away, and he told himself that perhaps it was the wine going to his head. "I'm glad you came," he finished disjointedly.

"Me too." Han smiled, his eyes shading quizzical on the next beat. "How 'bout you? What have you been up to, this past year? I heard something on the holonets a while back about the Jedi archives, or something."

"Yes, we found them."

Han cracked a grin. "That's not what I heard. I heard *_you*_ found them. Down in the undercity, six miles below old Palpatine's palace, no less. I'd have figured they'd hide 'em somewhere more remote than that, but maybe Palps figured the same thing."

"They were coded into the memory-core of an old, derelict ship. &gt;From the Imperials' perspective, it would just look like another piece of garbage."

"But not to you?"

Luke dropped his gaze to the sand. "It was an old T-16. The kind I used to have on Tatooine."

Han gave a long, low whistle. "Guess it takes one Jedi to second-guess another."

"Perhaps."

"Unless you think old Ben had something to do with it," Han suggested cautiously.

Luke nodded. "The skyhopper was a present when I turned fifteen. I'm guessing my uncle may have gotten some... help... in his decision to buy it."

Han swore through his teeth, then darted an almost furtive glance at Luke. "So did you find anything useful?" he asked in a low voice. "About your father, maybe?"

"Nothing about my father, so far. Just some of the history and philosophy, things Ben must've thought I'd need to know. Yoda's teachings about the Force..." Luke spread his hands. "It'll take me years to decode it all."

"So that's what you're getting back to in a few days," Han surmised.

"Probably tomorrow or the day after," Luke agreed, "though the Cabans said I can stay longer if I want."

"So they're showing you the good life up in their mansion, are they?" Han nodded unerringly in the direction of the Cabans' stately ancestral home, now far out of sight beyond the high cliffs and a long stretch of moorland. "Don't look so surprised," he said, grinning at Luke's expression. "I used to live around here when I was a kid."

"You..." Luke paused, taking a long look around. *"_Here?_"* His voice came out hushed with awe, and Han started to laugh.

"Well, everyone's gotta be from *_somewhere.*_"

"Yes, but..." He was examining everything about the place now, trying to imagine how it might have looked through Han's eyes as a child. "Why didn't Leia say something?"

"Probably 'cause she didn't know. I mean, I sure never told her."

"But -- are you related to the Cabans, then?"

"Shit, no!" Han laughed out loud. "No way. 'M just the son of a lowly trawler captain, that's all."

It took Luke a moment to realize that he was grinning like a fool. It was just the way that Han looked at him sometimes, a warmth in his smile that bypassed his carefully structured defenses as easily as the sun breaking through the clouds. He was never sure quite what he gave away at times like this. Only that it couldn't be helped, because falling in love wasn't a voluntary act.

"I can't really stay either, y'know," Han said quietly. "Got a delivery to make on Sullust in a couple of days."

"You're leaving tonight already?"

Han didn't answer right away, and Luke saw his gaze stray in the direction of the party, where the band had launched into a jig. The silhouettes of dancers made flowing shapes against the firelight, caught up in a rhythm that reminded Luke of the water. "Doesn't have to be now," Han said finally, in an abstracted tone. "Could leave tomorrow night and still be there in lots of time." The look he slanted Luke was both a question and a tenuous invitation.

"Maybe we could do something," Luke suggested, mentally clearing his slate of a number of less-than-pressing errands. "I've got access to a glider while I'm here, and Leia's kept me so busy, I haven't had a chance to see much of Corellia."

"No?" The corner of Han's mouth quirked into a little smile. "Sure could show you a thing or two, I guess. It'd be nice to get caught up."

"Yeah. And I want the long version."

"In that case you might wanna shelve whatever you had planned for the next week or three n' come along to Sullust. That's the only way I could give you the full rendition."

"It can't be *_that*_ bad."

"Oh, it's worse," Han grimaced and scrubbed a hand through his hair, mussing it so it stood up in short dark tufts behind his ear. He fell silent a moment, suddenly awkward. "Well, see you tomorrow, I guess. I'm docked over on those platforms just north of here; level three, bay six."

"What time?"

"Early. Wake me up, if you want."

Luke grinned. "Right, I'll see you in a couple hours, then."

"Within *_reason*,_" Han threw him a mock scowl. "Not Jedi Standard Time."

Luke chuckled. "Suppose I can wait until the sun's up."

Han snorted in mock disgust and Luke waited, expecting him to walk away.

"Uh, yeah," Han muttered, as if the thought of leaving hadn't quite hit him yet. "Tomorrow." He started away with a self-conscious shake of his head.

Luke propelled himself back towards the party, then stopped, immobilized by something he couldn't consider. *_I need to know.*_ He turned in the exact moment that Han wheeled to face him and they stood frozen, staring at each other.

"Luke...?"

Luke's heart shot to the base of his throat, pounding there with inexplicable ferocity. "Yeah?"

"Do you..." Han lifted his hand in a motion that never quite completed itself, a flash of self-directed temper giving way to amusement. "Luke," he said again, and this time there was something entirely different in his voice. A texture like dark velvet. "Do you wanna dance?"

"Do I want to--" Luke glanced over at the swaying dancers, wondering if Han could possibly have said what he thought he just had. "I... don't know how."

"Sure you do," Han countered. "I've seen it a hundred times, you n' your lightsaber."

"You were watching me? When...?"

"Back on Coruscant. I'd wake up early lots of days, way before anyone else. Nothin' to do but grab a kaf n' go over to the training complex, watch for a while. 'T's not like Leia n' me were in any shape to--" Han squared his shoulders in an embarrassed half-shrug. "You don't mind?"

"I just thought I'd have noticed," Luke said in confusion.

"'M glad you didn't; I didn't want you to."

_*Maybe that's why, too.*_ It made a certain kind of sense, so long as he didn't consider it too closely. "I don't mind," he said softly, and let the knowledge settle within, the latest in a collection of private treasures. "But," he warned gently, "lightsaber practice's a little different from dancing."

"Not so far's I can see. You were something else, like... like the wing-dancers from Tolus. Coulda watched you all day."

"You--" There was no acceptable ending for that sentence, so Luke just shook his head. "I can't."

"But do you *_want*_ to?" Han insisted, his posture tensing as if he were braced for the worst.

Luke took a deep breath. He felt unexpectedly naked under the searching gaze, as if every secret were written out in the flush rising to his face. "Yes." The husky sound of his voice startled him.

"You do?" Han looked like he'd swallowed something. As if reality had deserted him as well now, and the distance between them shrank, dreamlike, to a simple matter of steps. Han's breath trailed against the side of his face, an accidental caress when their hands found each other.

"Kid, I..." Han shook his head, fingers tightening through Luke's. "C'mon. I'll prove it to you."

They crossed the distance like sleepwalkers. Curious stares from a dozen or more well-dressed strangers registered on Luke as peripheral information, his consciousness centered where Han's warm, callused palm was clamped around his. Han towed him through the maze of swaying dancers until they found an empty spot beside the stage. "Almost forgot," he said, looking down at their feet. "We're supposed to take off our boots."

Luke glanced around, realizing that the other dancers were, indeed, barefoot. "Why?"

"Tradition, I guess. Shows respect, like you're not treading too heavily on the land."

Luke stepped from his boots with a shrug and tossed them over beside the stage. He curled his toes into the sand and felt himself smile, struck with pure, sensual enjoyment at the damp coolness on his bare skin. An electrifying tremor ran up his legs, hairs rising against the fabric of his pants. "That's not the reason," he said softly, without thinking. "It's the Force in everything. It just feels good."

"You sure that's not a Jedi thing?"

"What do you think?"

Han dug his own feet in the sand and then smiled, a gentle, private smile that Luke recognized as a mirror to his own. "You're probably right," he murmured. Tossing his own boots aside, he caught hold of Luke's hand again, tugging him nearer. The music's insistent pulse merged with the textures of wind and sand and firelight, with the rhythm of blood beating between their fingers.

"C'mon," Han said softly. Anxious, coaxing.

_*You're beautiful.* _Luke caught the words back from the tip of his tongue. "How's this done?" he managed instead.

Han's free hand skimmed down to curve around his waist. "Easy. You make it up as you go along."

"Yeah?" He wondered if Han was talking about dancing or something else, but a large hand curved against his side and he lost track of his thoughts, leaning into the suggested movement. The music captured him an instant later, rocking him back -- and Han was there, the tall body pliant to his tentative sway. Unresisting.

A strange thrill swept him._ *We could do anything.* _He caught Han's shoulder with his free hand, molding fabric to a hidden landscape of sinew and bone. It *_was*_ easy. Movement for the pleasure of it, its purpose alien to the clash of sabers, though the language was identical. He ducked under Han's arm, wheeled on his axis without letting go. Knowing without knowing, effortlessly completing one another. As natural as breath, as flight.

Han eased him through another turn and looped an arm around him from behind, anchoring Luke against the solidity of his chest. They spread their arms together, interlaced fingers splayed on the wind. A wildness rippled between them, and when Luke closed his eyes they were bodiless. Pure energy, like flames leaping into the sky. He reached behind himself to wrap his hands around the back of Han's neck, swaying together as the music switched to a wilder rhythm. He spun out of Han's grip, let him catch his hand again to pull him close, laughed when Han caught his waist and tipped him back playfully. There was only one way to do this, movement flowing from a shared physical alchemy.

_*We are hunting. We're flying. We... are.*_

They were shouting, words lost to the boisterous skirl of reed flutes and tympanns. The jig left them crushed together, close and breathless. "See what I mean?" Han's mouth was beside his ear, heartbeats skimming each other in the narrow space between their bodies.

"Yes." Even with his eyes closed, he felt Han smile. Knew every part of him, inside and out, and understood that he was known as well when they slipped into the music's new, gentler rhythm. Han's arm curved around his shoulders, and Luke felt a flush of warmth steal through his body, an answering tremor in the taller man's frame. He thought of Yavin IV, of Endor, of rushing to throw his arms around Han when holding each other became the only conceivable expression for what they felt.

But this was still new, something he'd never guessed could happen. Small pangs lit through his belly when the dark head came down to rest on his shoulder, a measure of surrender. Impossible to decode. *_I'm dreaming,* _he decided. And with that, he could let it just go on being easy. So easy, to ruffle his fingers through Han's hair and smooth down the shaggy tufts, luxuriating in thick softness. Han relaxed against him with a sigh.

"I missed you too," Luke whispered. The words made sense now, conveying more than just a pale half-truth.

A rough cheek brushed his own, stubble leaving a rasping afterimage on his skin. "I can tell," Han murmured.

Luke tipped Han's chin up, searching his gaze and finding the beginnings of a shaky, astonishingly youthful smile. "Aw, kid--"

Large hands cupped his face. A breath hung suspended between them, opening into a drift of thoughtless amazement when Han's mouth closed over his own, gentle and direct. His eyes slipped shut, awareness spilling over into a tapestry of rich heat. Into softness and a melting pressure, the taste of spiced wine. Their tongues met and they sank into a different rhythm, a dance he'd only dreamed about. Han growled softly, deepened the kiss with a thrust of his tongue, and Luke realized he was pressing back just as hungrily. Burning up for it, wanting more. Aching. He locked both hands behind Han's neck, pulling him down in search of fuller contact. Alarm cut through a heartbeat later, the knowledge that this changed everything intruding with disruptive force. He pulled back knowing it was already too late, the margins of safety well crossed several minutes ago.

Han blinked, disoriented. "What?" he whispered. His thumb traced the curve of Luke's cheek, a query phrased in touch. "I coulda sworn you wanted--"

_*I do.* _The words clogged in his throat, and he just shook his head.

"Sorry, kid." Han leaned their foreheads together for a moment and then shifted his weight backwards, stepping away.

"Wait." Luke caught his shoulder, his mind stumbling over phrases too clumsy to embody a fraction of the truth.

The sound of a feminine throat being cleared jolted them both into a wider reality. They turned like a pair of awakening dreamers, reorienting themselves. Toben Caban was standing with her arms folded in the depths of her shawl, cropped hair shining silver in the firelight. "Sorry to disturb you, gentlemen." She twitched a delicate brow, dark blue eyes lighting with a spark that could have been irony, or perhaps amusement. "The tide's coming in faster than we thought, and if you still wanted to make an offering, Han, now would be the time. Or," the corners of her mouth crinkled good-humoredly, "if you two are busy, I could take it for you."

Han shook his head. "Thanks, Toby, but I think this's one I'd better deliver myself."

"Yes, I thought you might feel that way." She turned away with a cryptic smile, threading her way back through the crowd. That was when Luke noticed that the music had stopped and that servers were at work now, dismantling tables and unstringing lights. Someone was shouting above the crowd, announcing the name of the tavern where the celebration was due to reconvene.

Han was watching him intensely, a cool wind from the ocean fanning dark hair about his face. "There's something I've gotta do.... uh, maybe I'll see you tomorrow." He turned for the shoreline without waiting for an answer, a few quick strides carrying him from the circle of firelight.

Luke stared after his retreating figure. "Han?" Frank rebellion jolted him back into action. He scooped up their boots and jogged after Han, calling out to him again. "You forgot these."

Han stared at his boots as though he didn't quite recognize them. "Thanks," he muttered, accepting them with a quizzical look. They fell in step without discussion, the encroaching surf beating through long moments of silence. The gentle wavelets had become breakers in the time they'd danced, crashing across their path now to fill out scalloped edges of thick salty foam.

"Aren't you at least going to ask where we're going?" Han's question came tinged with amusement.

"Thought I'd find out when we get there." Luke paused, sensing something deeply private in Han's demeanor. "If that's all right with you."

Han dipped his chin, nodding once. "Yeah. It's all right."

And it was. Strangely comfortable to be walking like this, without a clear destination. Luke guessed there were a hundred things he should be saying to Han, yet every thought seemed caught in the orbit of an exquisite, piercing aftertaste, words dissolving into it like spray. As if they'd been given all the time in the world, and walking together was just... good.

His boots thumped against his back in time with his steps, counterpoint to the ocean's deeper, connecting rhythm. The fine sands were marked with the herringbone tracks of shorebirds, and boulders were humped along the shoreline like sentinels, crusted over with layer upon layer of life. Everything was stirring now, awakening at the onset of the tide. He could sense the quick, silvery movements of fish below the surface of tidepools, the gradual unfurling of tentacles from the polished throats of shells. Water lapped over his bare feet, depositing twists of kelpweed like dark, metamorphic gifts.

"Do you and Toben know each other?" he asked eventually. Not even close to the things they ought to be talking about.

Han hiked up his boots where they'd slipped from the crook of his arm. "Only in a roundabout way. Her first husband, Pyr, served in the resistance with my uncle Max'en. They got to be pretty good friends. That's around the time Pyr met Galt, n' how Toby ended up with two husbands instead of one. Ask her sometime. It's quite a story."

"Maybe I will," Luke said, his gaze now travelling the rough outline of clifftops angainst the stars. "I like it here."

"Yeah?" Han glanced over at him, looking pleased.

"Yes. The people, how they live with the ocean and with each other. They know the Force, even if they'd deny it."

Han snorted softly. "Well don't get too carried away. 'T's a great place to live if you happen to be heir to a Guild rulership. Not so great if you're one of the unwashed masses, like ma and I were. Things changed a lot during the occupation, and Toby in particular's been working hard to break down the old attitudes. But let's face it, it still matters who your parents were. I mean, Toby's making a difference because she *_can,*_ if you know what I'm sayin'."

Luke nodded slowly. Han glanced over at him when he didn't answer right away. "Hey, 't's not like *_I* _think it matters who your--"

"I know," Luke cut in, smiling to reassure him. "I was just thinking." He reached on impulse to capture Han's hand in his own, and felt a small start travel through the taller man's frame. "I've been doing so much reading about the Force, but this--" He gestured to the ocean, the stars and sky, "I feel so much closer to it, just being here." Han gave his hand a squeeze, and they walked on in silence. The dock where Luke had said goodbye to Leia came within view up ahead, starlight painting its skeletal shadow across the beach and the advancing waves.

"Mother brought me here after my dad was killed, three summers before she disappeared," said Han as they drew closer to the dock. "We moored at Bandish point -- that's one of the little towns just north of here, and she trawled for my uncle Max'en. I used to come down here n' play under this pier when the sun got to be too much." He paused at the foot of the dock, gazing up into the weed-crusted maze of durasteel supports. "Hardly looks the same anymore," he added, grinning. "Everything's kinda... smaller."

Luke glanced at the sweep of pebbly sand between the worn pylons, picturing a brown-haired boy with skinned knees and hazel eyes, his tanned body molded from the sun-striped shadows.

"'T's where I came when I got the news about Ma, too," Han added. "No one ever could figure out what happened to her. They found her boat way out on the open water. No sign of anything wrong with it, but no sign of her either." He rolled up the cuffs of his pantlegs and started for the waterline.

Luke stifled the impulse to go after him. "Han," he asked softly, "what're you doing?"

Han paused, turning to look at him almost reluctantly. "You're supposed to bring offerings to weddings." He fumbled inside his vest and drew something white from an inside pocket. "Something to show goodwill for the people gettin' married. It's bad luck for them to know what you brought, though, n' that's why they've got to leave before the tide turns back." Luke stepped closer, his feet sinking in the wet sand. The object between Han's fingers looked like nothing more than a folded slip of paper. Then Han shifted it between his thumb and forefinger, and it unfolded as if by magic, becoming a tiny ship.

Luke drew in a soft breath of delight, reaching to touch it. "Did you make this?"

Han nodded.

Luke ran a fingertip along a fragile gunwale, mesmerized by its precision. The ship's design was much like the traditional wind-driven Corellian vessels he'd seen holos of, its single paper sail billowing forward to cradle an imaginary breeze. It reminded him of the model spaceships he'd built when he was growing up, and of Han, stretched on his back in any one of the Falcon's crawlways, wielding delicate tools as if they'd become an extension of his being.

"It's a peace-boat, like the ones sent between clans to seal a truce," Han explained. "In real life it'd be loaded down with fruits and cheeses and jars of salted fish, but it'd be kinda hard to make all that out of paper."

"It's beautiful."

"Well... it was all I could think of."

"She'd understand what you meant."

"Yeah?" Han gave a self-derisive snort. "'M not so sure I do. But anyway..." He started into the breakers, wading out a few strides to set the little craft down in gentler waters. He stood for a while, thigh-deep, watching the ship as it rode the incoming swells. "Clear skies," he said at last, invoking the universal blessing of sailors and pilots before turning back.

Luke touched his arm as he reached the shore. "They are."

"Are what?" The hooded gaze swept up to fix his own, and Luke wondered how to put in words what he'd seen in Leia's eyes at the wedding.

"Clear," he said, at a loss to express it any other way.

Han stared at him a moment longer. "All right." The corner of his mouth quirked into the faintest beginning of a smile. "Thanks."

They walked to the top of the beach, pausing to put their boots on again before climbing to sit among the tumble of boulders below the roadway. Han drew his knees up to his chest, arms clasped around himself in an uncharacteristically contained posture, eyes fixed on the advancing waterline. Luke waited beside him, his senses caught into a burgeoning momentum of change that somehow felt entirely familiar. Everything here was part of the dance, a cycle of life that might bring them together or push them apart, though in the here and now, there was room only for peace. A moment complete in itself, lacking nothing. The first breaker shattered against the rocks below, sending plumes of saltspray misting into their faces.

"I never meant to hurt her," Han said, breaking the silence as if on cue.

Luke waited, guessing there was more.

"And I really did love her," Han went on. "Still do. It'd be a lot simpler if I didn't, maybe then I'd have figured it out sooner. But the way things were, it was all so new, caring so much about both of you when it'd just been me n' Chewie for the longest time. What I felt for her just made sense to me back then. She's smart, and beautiful, and..." Han paused, scratching hard at a spot behind his ear. It kinda felt familiar. Like..." He grimaced. "Like in the spaceports, I guess. The physical attraction part came easy, and I cared about her too, so I guess I thought it was something it wasn't. Maybe both of us did. I just *_wanted_ *it to be this forever thing, because..." He trailed off, and there Luke saw the fine set of tension around his mouth, the tide-marks of a private anguish. "'Cause it was the only way I could see of hangin' on to you."

"Me?"

"She's your sister." Han's tone was bitter with self-mockery. "You've got no idea how *_happy*_ I was to hear that, and -- oh, damn, it was so selfish. Up 'till then I'd just figured the two of you were gonna..." He gestured vaguely. "Well, you know. I thought you were in love with her."

"You thought...?" Luke had to bite back a laugh. "Han -- no."

"Even at first? You seemed... well, *_crazy*_ about her."

Luke shook his head. "I always felt there was... something, a kind of connection between us. And in the beginning, I might've mistaken it for something it wasn't, but... no." He studied Han's profile in the starlight, wondering exactly when he'd realized the difference. But there was no particular moment that stood out. Just a gradual building of awareness, a beautiful secret shored up in the space behind his breastbone. "It's not the same thing," he said at last.

"Yeah." Han tugged at a clump of waterweed poking up between the rocks. "Damn. Wish I'd known, not that it would've changed anything. It was a disaster from the get-go, I was just too stubborn to see it. Even once she started spending so much time with Ryiisa, and I was gettin' all those dreams..." He cut himself off with a firm shake of his head.

"What dreams?"

"Sure you wanna know?" A breaker struck hard, spattering foam through the air around them. Han studied him in the nebulous light, waiting until he nodded in assent.

"Okay. The one I remember the most is of you, standing in a web of blue fire--"

"You *_saw*_ that?" Luke's mouth went dry.

"It's something they did to you, isn't it?" It wasn't a question. The words snapped off like dry twigs, brittle with anger. Luke didn't realize he'd clutched the right hand against his belly until Han reached down to catch it with his own. "There's more," he warned.

"Go on."

Han took a deep breath. "At first I thought you were burning up. There was this... rage. Big as the ocean, I remember thinking. Big enough to rip stars outta the sky."

"Yes." Luke's voice felt like sandpaper in his throat. "That was me." He groped for words to explain something that existed on a level beyond language, the shattering dislocation of will from mind from spirit, of every emotion turned in on itself and shown back to him, withered and unrecognizable. But then Han's fingers tightened through his and drew him back the present, to an understanding that required no explanation.

"I know," Han said softly. "Not sure how. But someone screamed -- might've been me, might've been you, I could never tell. I'd wake up in a cold sweat and not be able to move or breathe. Scared the hell outta me." He lifted his gaze to the horizon, the distant razor-line between stars and sky. "But it kept on coming back, n' after a while I saw it wasn't fire you were standing in at all. More like a kind of burning ice, real cold. And I figured well, we've lived through the cold before, and... I guess that's where I finally started to understand." He glanced down at their joined hands, then up again, meeting Luke's eyes. Luke held his breath, stilled by something in the dark gaze, an intensity threatening to rock his composure. "That was the morning I woke up and knew I had to leave."

"Why?" Luke heard his voice like a stranger's, months of loss threatening to explode the quiet surface tension.

"D'you understand, I'd scared myself silly?" Han's knuckles whitened in their grip around his hand. "I mean, I could say I didn't want to lose you as a friend, or that I thought you'd never forgive me for hurtin' your sister, and those are part of it too. Had myself believing 'em long enough myself, but I always knew it was a lot more n' that. You were gettin' to be more of a Jedi every day, never seemed to need a thing. And I'd never wanted something so bad, like..." His voice broke.

Luke grasped his shoulders, hauling him close.

"...like oxygen," Han whispered. "Like blood, kid."

The words hung in the air between them. Broken sounds, incomplete, like an arid sky burning up for rain. Luke slid his arms around Han's shoulders and brushed his lips to a stubbled cheek, felt an answering caress in the warm breath escaping beside his ear. "I was in the fire with you, Luke. Holding you like I did that night in the tent, and you were holdin' me too. And you... we... were together--"

"Breathing together," Luke supplied, instinct filling in where the sentence trailed off. Powerful arms wrapped around him, tight enough to make his ribs ache. "It's okay," he whispered into the fringe of tangled hair, rubbing his cheek against the curve of Han's jawline. "Thank you."

"Luke." Han's heartbeat was caged against his sternum, a wildly accelerating cadence of wingbeats. "Sure hope this means more n' a thank you, 'cause I--"

"Yes."

"Yeah...?"

Luke brought their mouths together, heard Han speak his name on a ragged, hungry exhalation, strong hands rising to trap his face. He closed his eyes into a searching ferocity, a kiss that flooded his senses with ice and salt and the rough heat of Han's palms. He pressed forward, mouth and skin surging to life with prickles of crawling heat, his body stirring alive to a force that ran deeper than pleasure.

He was only dimly aware that his hands slid down the length of Han's back, of the vest's material abrading his palms, ropy muscles arching into his touch. Han tugged him closer, and Luke slung a thigh over his lap, their precarious balance forgotten in the consuming drive to get closer. His knee skidded on the rock and he pitched forward, plowing against Han. They overbalanced and landed in a heap, laughing, Han's breath knocked out in a sharp hiss.

Luke grabbed his arm and braced his leg against a boulder to halt their slide. "Are you okay?"

A winded chuckle gusted against the side of his neck, long arms twining around him. "Shoulda known," Han muttered.

"Known what?"

Han thrust a leg between his thighs and flipped him on his back, pinning his arms. "Impatient, aren't you?" There was a note of challenge in his voice, but his eyes held something else, a haze of unrestrained feeling that froze Luke spellbound. A hand closed on the front of his pants with blunt directness, molding his length through intervening layers of fabric. He hadn't felt himself go hard, and the probing touch was revealing him to himself in ways he'd never guessed, charting his body like newly discovered territory.

A throaty, wordless murmur shivered through him, unbidden, and he rocked upwards, gasping at the sharp recoil of sensation. At the way Han's grip tightened around him, fiercely possessive. An answering tremor snaked down the long fingers, imprinting itself through cloth and skin. "Kid--" Han paused, shook his head. His voice had dropped several notes when he continued. "You don't hafta thank me."

He moved his hand before Luke could think of an answer, unsnapping the front of his pants and easing down the zip to delve inside. Luke sucked in a sharp breath at the brush of cool air on his rigid, aching flesh, at the sigh pooling warmth in the hollow of his throat.

"You're so damn beautiful."

Words that matched none of the ways he'd come to see himself, an unexpected gift like the kiss that followed, buried within the open collar of his shirt. Then Han was sliding down the length of his body, pressing kisses to his chest and belly before pushing his pants down to ride lower on his hips. "Lemme show you..." A hand peeled his underwear aside and eased between his thighs, cupping him tenderly. The dark head lowered, Han's mouth scattering cool, reverent touches on overheated skin, tongue flicking playfully through the curls at the base of his erection.

He reached down, knotted his fingers into shaggy hair, whispered Han's name -- a raw, strange sound. Half-protest, because this was nothing like he'd imagined.

"Relax, kid."

And his solitary fantasies were dissolving, collapsing like dry husks under Han's insistent, kneading caresses, strong hands coaxing his hips forward in jolts of sharp pleasure. Lips and teeth, marking his inner thighs with delicate bites. Han burrowed deeper between his legs, lapping warm, lazy circles at the base of his sac before opening to cradle each of his balls in turn, commanding his surrender with gentle suction and teasing swirls of his tongue. Then at last, his hand closed around Luke's erection, stroking upwards with explicit pressure.

Luke struggled up on one elbow, straining to comprehend the sight of Han -- his friend, the man he loved -- kneeling between his legs, head cradled between his thighs. Hands and mouth caressing him, driving him fast to the limits of endurance. He fell back, helpless, writhing against his pants' restrictive waistband in a half-understood impulse to open himself completely, to demand everything.

His fingers clenched on Han's shoulder with bruising force, voice rasping harshly, words long gone. Han's mouth released him, a hand slipping down to shelter his damp skin against the cold air. A blunt thumb worked its way lower, probing deeply between his legs. Luke bucked against it, pushing towards the gentle invasion, then froze, half sobbing. The liquid pressure behind his groin was melting, his belly's core opening into a startling infinity. He caught himself on the brink, trembling, braced against the onslaught of piercing sensations.

"I'm... falling," he whispered.

Han looked up, meeting his gaze along the rigid arch of his body, a firm hand stroking down from his navel. Soothing him. "You're safe now."

"Yeah?" He needed to hear it, needed to know.

Han leaned forward to kiss the tip of his erection, his voice rough and tender when he spoke. "Come, Luke. 'S okay." The words fanned warmly against his exposed crown, and that was all it took. More than enough.

His body came unstrung into wild, shuddering blindness, hips and legs surging in spasm. A wild shout carried his voice upward, lost in the roar of incoming breakers. And Han was there to catch him, a steadying hand on his flank. Fingers lacing through his own when he reached down to grab hold.

Spinning darkness held him for a moment, suspended in airless heights, his throat raw. Then his next breath surged in, burning down to his core, every cell awakening. He drifted, aware of nothing but Han's hand in his own. And then Han's mouth on his skin, lapping along his softening erection to gather up the sticky wetness of his release.

"Mmmph." Han nuzzled the length of his belly up to his navel, bestowing soft kisses as he went. "You taste like..." He trailed off, seeming at a loss for an appropriate descriptor.

_*Like hunger*,_ Luke thought. *_Like need.*_

"Han, c'mere." The words came out harsh and thready, disconnected. He tugged Han's arm, following thoughtless instinct, and felt the long body settle against his in the rocky crevice, their legs tangling. Han's lips trailed his eyebrow and across the bridge of his nose.

"You okay?" The question drifted warmly against his cheekbone.

He wasn't sure what he said in reply, words evaporating when he caught the side of Han's face and pulled his mouth down, capturing a new taste when their tongues met . A mingling of essences now, his seed changed by Han's tasting of it to become something unique. Theirs. He closed his eyes, searching out intoxicating remnants, testing the limits of what this was, what it could become.

Han smiled when they finally broke for air. "Wasn't sure if you'd wanna do that."

"I--" Luke paused, surprised. "Why not?"

Han laughed softly, a helpless grin breaking through. "This ain't what I thought it'd be, y'know."

"Then... what?"

Han shook his head. "I don't even know anymore what I really imagined. I mean, did you...?" he finished the question with a lopsided shrug.

_*Did I imagine?*_

"Yes."

Han's smile deepened, his gaze shading to a gleam of feral triumph, and Luke's heart did an odd little flip behind his breastbone. He caught Han into another kiss, opening deeply, cradling the dark head between his hands. "There's more," he whispered. "I really want..." He trailed off. The memory of solitary nights confronted him like a blank wall, a stopping place for desires turned back on themselves because they'd had no place else to go.

Han's arms clamped across his back as if to steady him, the gentle mouth buried in his hair. "Anything, kid. I mean it."

_*Anything.*_

Contours of flesh and bone pressed against him full length, warmth branding him through the thin barrier of their clothing. Han's erection was trapped between them, outlined explicitly in the hollow beside his hip. A memory of firelight sang through his veins, throbbing in time with a dance his body had always known.

"This." He caught Han's shoulder and pushed him down, catching his breath with a sharp thrill when Han yielded to him, trust and consent in the generous sprawl of limbs. Luke slid across him and heard a growl of recognition, even satisfaction, when his leg slipped between Han's thighs, pushing them apart in answer to some unknown want.

"Think you got me where you want me, hmm?" The dark eyes sparked teasingly.

"I don't know," Luke whispered, the only answer he could honestly give. His hands were already moving, tracking the line of Han's pulse down to where it disappeared in the collar of his shirt. Things he'd hardly dared imagine seemed within reach now, pounding up beneath his hands where they swept across Han's chest. A surge of breath, a ragged sigh. A small nipple hardened through the material of Han's shirt, poking between his fingers.

"C'mere Luke, closer dammit--" Strong hands grasped his hips, hauling him into closer alignment. The maneuver shifted their weight in the rock crevice, and they started to slide again. Luke shot out a hand to slow their descent and Han reacted simultaneously, jamming one foot against the wall of the cleft. "Maybe we'd better just keep it simple for now," Han amended. He jolted Luke forward with a playful tilt of his hips, centering him squarely on top of his cock. "What d'you say?"

Luke froze, speechless. This was Han as he could never have imagined him, the solid heat of him pressing up between his legs. His body was on pins and needles, sensations magnified to a blistering clarity, so that Han's gaze felt like a physical touch on his skin. "I--" He sucked in a hard breath, caught on the edge of a desire he couldn't name, clenching his thighs around the muscled torso in an impulse to hold Han, to keep him.

"Yeah, I know." Han's fingers slid up to capture his arms, gentling him, drawing him down. "Me too."

Han's smile curved against his lips when he opened to kiss him. His breath escaped in an explosive sigh and he felt himself switch to demand in a flash second, catching Han's face in his hands. Mapping and claiming, he explored with taste, touch and a hundred disparate sensations; the tang of sweat on Han's skin, the lingering aroma of woodsmoke from the cooking fires. The bristle of an eyebrow against his tongue, the luxuriant softness of lashes batting the tip of his nose. *_This is real.* _He let out a quiet laugh.

"What?"

"Just... I've thought of this so often. Touching you." His fingers were struggling with the fasteners of Han's shirt, carding through the dark fuzz exposed in his open collar.

Han reached to help him, fumbling for a moment before finally grabbing a fistful of material and yanking the shirt from his waistband. "Help yourself."

Luke slid his hands under the shirt's hem to explore the flat plane of Han's stomach, fanning his hands along the curve of his ribcage and down again, outlining his navel and cradling his lean hips. Han tugged the shirt up higher, a tilt of his chest brazenly directing Luke towards one of his nipples. Luke flicked his tongue against the nub of hardened flesh, tasting sweat and sea water, and something else. Something he couldn't name.

Han's fingers slipped inside his jacket, easing it off his shoulders, unhooking the clips that held his shirt. His own nipples puckered in the cool night air, hardening to points under the glide of Han's touch. Neither of them was speaking now, absorbed in the task of learning each other in new ways, with taste and touch. Eventually Luke realized that his hips were grinding against Han's and that Han was pushing against him, bodies writhing into the rhythm of building pressure.

He reached down, cupping Han's erection through the front of his pants before curiosity got the better of him and he unclipped the belt, working his hand into wanton, physical heat. There was no underwear to push aside, nothing to impede his progress. Nothing but Han, hot and solid in his hand, the rasp of coarse hair against his knuckles, silky skin damp with sweat. He curled his hand around the base of the shaft and stroked upwards.

Han gasped, snaked an arm across his shoulders and arched to kiss him, teasing out his tongue to capture it in his own mouth. Possession, flowing both ways. A big hand skimmed the length of his side and slid under his belly, cradling his groin. Luke cried out, hips surging forward in outright demand, and he groaned when Han's fingers wrapped around him and stroked him erect with an almost careless tenderness.

Their legs twined and they rocked together, completing each other in an unbroken symmetry of movement. So easy. Like the rush of cold air into his lungs, the rapid-fire pulse outlining the side of Han's neck, exposed and vulnerable when he tossed back his head. Trust, unconditional. Luke bent his head to kiss the crawl of gooseflesh on Han's chest, the small scar slanting below his lip. Opened himself and learned to breathe underwater when Han wrapped a hand around the back of his head and pulled him into a hard, demanding kiss.

He could feel the Force in everything, their lovemaking reflected back to him from the rocks and sea and sky, in the cries of gulls and beyond that, the pull of the moons on the water and the distant music of stars. A breaker spattered over them, stinging cold across his exposed back.

He caught Han's wrist and trapped it into stillness. "Let me," he whispered, and took both of them together in his hand. Blood against blood, a hard pulse throbbing down the length of him when he stroked their joined erections. Han pulled him down until their chests nearly touched, fingers digging into his arms. Breath against breath, his voice matched with Han's in an erratic cadence until Han stiffened, arching into him.

"Luke--" His eyes snapped open, a hand wrapping around Luke's chin. Tension exploded into thick, hot bursts against Luke's palm. He froze, awestruck as Han's expression loosened into an ecstasy that reminded him of flight and yet wasn't, something that rocked through both of them and lifted them together, making him want to laugh or shout or cry. There was just time to bring his hand up to his mouth, to capture Han's taste undiluted on his tongue, to lean down and bury himself in a welcoming kiss before his body shot past the limits of control.

The meltdown heat ebbed gradually into a soft incandescence between their bodies. Han steadied him with gentle hands, drew his head down to his shoulder, and Luke smelled sex and sweat and the ocean on their skin. *_Alive,* _he thought. A gift that couldn't be earned. He wound his arms around Han's neck and they lay for a while, listening to the breakers.

 

* * *

 

In the end, the tide forced them from the shelter of the crevice. They climbed over the tumble of boulders and made their way along the narrow service road in dazed silence, following it to where a vertical groove had been drilled in the cliff face to accommodate a lift. Han summoned the lift cage with a smack of his hand against the control panel, and they waited as the antiquated device creaked to a halt in front of them. Inside, Han tapped out a sequence of numbers on the grease-laden keypad.

"They still haven't changed the code, even after all these years," he remarked, turning to Luke with the ghost of an awkward smile. Ancient hydraulics squealed into action, hauling them towards the landing terraces. "Used to ride up here to watch the pilots n' crews work on their ships. Wasn't supposed to, of course, but that never stopped me."

"How old were you?"

"Eight. Nine, maybe. Couldn't wait 'till I was old enough to blast off this rock." Han gave a small, rueful smile. "Swore I'd never be back, y'know."

"I know that feeling."

"Yeah, thought you might." Han stopped the lift on the third terrace, some sixty meters above the beach. Luke followed him out on to the wide permacite deck, shivering as cooler winds knifed through his damp clothing. A few air-gliders and other small craft were dotted about. The Millennium Falcon dwarfed them all, presiding over the entire rear third of the terrace. Luke swept a fond glance over her, noting a little extra carbon-scoring here, a few extra welds and patches there. He resolved that tomorrow he'd ask Han to tell him the story behind each and every one of them. For now, he simply joined him at the platform's edge, following the direction of his gaze to the northern sweep of shoreline where a row of tiny hamlets took shelter against the cliff's flank. Scores of boats were tethered along the docks, their mast-lanterns bobbing in rhythm with the tide. The wind carried strains of music from the shoreline taverns in snatches of disconnected sound.

"Han," he prompted, when the silence began to stretch on. "What is it?"

Han gave a slow shake of his head, pointing to one of the docks. "That's where my mother used to berth our trawler; right down there, same jetty where Uncle Max docked his fleet. He used to pay me to mend his nets in the off seasons. Helped us out, I guess." He sighed, darting a glance back at Luke over his shoulder. "Silly, you know, swearing I'd never come back. Never occurred to me I might change my mind. 'T's not like I missed home or something. Ma and I didn't have anything 'cept her boat, n' that was where we lived. Never started thinking about it 'till the first night you came aboard--" He hooked a thumb over his shoulder, indicating the Falcon. "It was just something about *_you*_." His voice lowered, softening, his face going a shade darker. "Wanted to see your eyes when you looked at the ocean the first time. Wanted to show you everything, the whole damn galaxy."

"You--" Luke stared at him, years of knowing Han reorienting themselves in a flash before his mind's eye. He recalled the noise and bustle of the hangar at Yavin IV and Han's voice, extending an invitation he couldn't have accepted. *_Why don't you come with us?*_

"You did." Luke took a step closer to the edge, closer to Han. He reached out, meaning to touch Han's arm, but his hand fell away, shy now. "You showed me--"

"Ord Mantell doesn't count, kid."

"No, I meant..." He was trying to gather random impressions into something that would make sense. "I was there with you. Wherever you went, part of me went with you." Luke paused, gauging by the firming of Han's jaw that what he'd left unsaid was understood. About Bespin, and the months of training and careful planning while Han was trapped in the carbon freeze.

"I know that," Han whispered. He crossed the short distance and caught Luke's hand in his own, gripping it with vehement force. "I wanna start over again. You think we can?"

"We don't have to," Luke replied on instinct, struck again by a sense of rhythm in all this, an unseen cycle sweeping them forward into the unknown. "We already have." He shrugged, and then lost his breath in a startled laugh when Han pulled him into a crushing embrace.

"I love you." The words low and quiet beside his ear, edged with fierce wanting. And Han said them again, kissing his face and hair, damp touches scattered on skin that suddenly felt overheated.

"You too," he whispered back. Amazed by how his voice broke, the way his eyes were burning.

"Yeah." A pause. "Clear skies, you think?"

From behind his closed lids, he could see the future like a solid expanse of silver, as unrevealing as the ocean. He turned in Han's arms, pointing down towards Max'en's dock. "Start there," he suggested. "Show me where you grew up."

"Not much to see," Han objected, but his arms tightened about Luke's waist just the same. "Tomorrow," he amended.

Luke leaned back into his embrace, the ridge of a collarbone cradling the back of his head as he looked up into the sky, so bright and crowded with stars. Alive. He closed his eyes.

_*Tomorrow.*_

A breeze stirred goosebumps along his arms, reminding him that their clothes were soaking wet. And then his belly growled, testament to the number of hours it had been since his last meal.

Han chuckled. "Sounds like you could do with a visit to the ship's galley. So could I, come to think of it."

"Guess we both worked up an appetite."

"Yeah," Han agreed, his voice dropping. "You never know. We might work up another one by morning."

 

* * * * *


End file.
